In my opinion, Mexicans have a right of return to the Southwestern United States. Repatriation can not be solely relegated to Mexico, with historical precedents and current needs of both American and Mexican peoples being complimentary to one another. We are countries and people at peacetime, and any politician who raises the spectre of a wall or ever increasing security measures that simply hamper day-to-day life for everyone is an opportunist with a military industrial complex agenda.
To prove my point, lets review some basic history.
US & European Invasion of Mexico 19th Century
The 19th century was a time of global turmoil, multiple countries were formed and reformed while others expanded into territories in service of their landed gentry and monied classes. Likewise, this was a time of great economic transformation for the United States and destitution for Mexico, with the latter fighting the US multiple times, Spain, France, England and Germany at some point or another in a span of 100 years.
During this century, the United States engaged in a number of actions meant to exploit and rob Mexico of its land, resources, and people. These unethical actions included, the annexation of Mexican territory, the imposition of unequal treaties, the extortion of land in exchange for debt relief, the relocation of Native Americans across the border into Mexico, and the forceful deportation of Mexicans after this group of individuals already provided labor at below market rates.
Worst of all, the US has unfairly taken valuable land from Mexico, including taking several large chunks of land that comprised most of what is now California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas, then turned around and called Mexicans inhabiting them as the source of all those regions problems despite providing the majority of the productive life in the region.
At the turn of the 20th century, the US invaded Mexico, most notably with the occupation of Veracruz in 1914 and 1916. During the period of US occupation, thousands of Mexicans were killed or injured, and the US exerted control over the country’s economic, political, and social systems. Additionally, the US assassinated or imprisoned various Mexican leaders of the Mexican revolution, notably Pancho Villa and Ricardo Flores Magon. Contemporaneously, the US has also sold arms to Mexico, only to then intervene in the country’s internal conflicts and favour of US interests. Lastly, during and after World War II and other periods of US history, Mexican citizens and citizens of Mexican descent were stripped of rights and persecuted including through the mass-deportation of Mexican-Americans. This is so despite many of these same Mexicans serving valiantly in segregated units in these world changing conflicts.
All of these actions served to further the economic and political interests of the United States, while leaving Mexico and Mexicans economically crippled and politically disempowered for decades, with only recent changes providing our community a lifeline into the 21st century. Despite this set of obstacles, Mexicans are the largest ethnic group in the Southwestern US while also a significant productive labor force and consumer base in the US.
Mexicans powered California’s 20th century ascent and current stance as the worlds 6th largest economic power. Mexicans build roads, we provide services, but most of all, we run things with dignity and without the legacy of oppression tied to the US government. Therefore, our stance in immigration is a simple one: we have a right to be here; legal documentation is an administrative task made into a federal and onerous one to provide otherwise irrelevant institutions income and political significance e.g. funding for unemployable people of the Border Patrol, ICE and other large swathes of the so called ‘swamp’ within the US federal government.
Border Policy Just Plays On Stereotypes That Discredit Mexicans
It’s no accident that in the popular folklore of America only guys who look like Bruce Willis can be heroic in the popular imagination.
Stereotypes usually have a functional purpose too. In the US political landscape, politicians make Mexicans appear dangerous, but undignified, and justify subsequent needs for pointless obstacle courses along a 2000+ mile long border between two nations not at war with one another. That narrative just so happens to feed a military industrial complex comprised of two-bit construction contractors, surveillance equipment makers and other providers of “relevant” combat material and intelligence.
Unsurprisingly, this isn’t the first time the US government has crafted a convenient story to justify increased military spending or activity directed at Mexican people. An entire recent Mexican presidency, that of Felipe Calderon, was crafted and manipulated by an American narrative that justified killing vast amounts of people in the name of stopping the flow of illicit drugs. Over 200,000 people are thought to have died over the policing style sponsored by the US in Mexico and the flow of armaments from the US to Mexico.
Many of the contemporary myths that hover over Mexican identity today were first developed by US and British authors in an effort to discredit respectable Mexican heroes in the early part of the 20th century. One of these myths was that Tequila was typically dranked by rebel Mexican troops during the revolutionary war period. Subsequently, this narrative was used to retroactively justify intervention in the acquisition of Mexican oil and the dog whistle was blown hard during Mexico’s formation of PEMEX, with British tabloids showing sleeping Mexicans mismanaging oil fields.
Fantasies of Haranguing And Disciplining Mexican Men Is As American As Apple Pie
In fact, one such revolutionary hero that was discredited in the American press is Pancho Villa. Villa was not a drunken slob as many people mistakenly think of when mentioning the general of the Division del Norte. Villa was a sober and cerebral man who contemplated defeating the unpopular government in Mexico City and also resented the US colonisation of Tejas, New Mexico, Arizona and California, going as far as conducting appropriation of guns and silver from American outposts, which he converted through deals with Wells Fargo. The latter is well documented by the University of California – Berkeley campus.
Never touching alcohol, Villa went from virtual exile in the New Mexico area to creating the heroic Division Del Norte, which struck fear in rich Mexican, American and British oligarch hearts.
Again, the myth of marauding drunk Mexicans who raped and pillaged was fabricated by British authors, who first linked Villa to Tequila, with the US press, like the LA Times, echoing the thought. The above cartoon is anLA Times 1914 depiction of a non-existing drunk “revolutionary” era Mexican. To this day, the image contemporaneously distributed within popular media about Mexicans riffs on these ideas to justify military attention.
US commanders relished the idea of killing Villa themselves. President Woodrow Wilson even assigned an entire battalion to invade a small portion of Mexico just to find him. Instead, Villa essentially retired with some of his wealth in Chihuahua after the war. Unfortunately, he was assassinated by political rivals during peace time in 1923, but effectively defied the US Army even in death since his assassination was likely connected to domestic turmoil, with US support for the assassins no doubt, but indirect at that point and post-revolutionary accomplishments. His legend was cemented and discussed in favourable ways subsequently.
Fortunately, much like Villa’s defiance, the Mexican defiance and resistance to American hegemony in the US Southwest is as true as it was during the revolutionary period. No longer a fragmented minority, Mexicans leverage modern technology to communicate protests, political actions, and while facing systemic discrimination in our access to large amounts of capital, we have some access to wealth via our ingenuity and dominance of specific sectors of the economy. These factors have permitted Mexicans to stand our ground throughout the region regardless of what fringe politicians, like Ron De Santis or Donald Trump, fantasise in their public discourses.